I like at least 1 device that actually works without issue. Like missing calls for a job interview for example is pretty bad and where I live google maps for public transit and cars are essential. OSM is horrible btw, a good 25% or more of places aren't on OSM where I live, and I can't just add them on the fly every time I need to go there.
this post was submitted on 25 Sep 2025
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Linux Phones
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The Discussion on Linux-based Phones.
Benefits:
- Hardware freedom.
- Perfect operating-system competition.
- Full utilization of specs.
- Phone lifespan raises to 10+ years.
- Less e-waste.
Linux Mobile Distros:
- Postmarket OS
- Ubuntu Touch
- Mobian
- Sailfish
- Manjaro Arm
- Pure OS
- Plasma Mobile
- LuneOS
- FuriOS
- Nemomobile
- Droidian
- Mobile NixOS
- ExpidusOS
- Maemo Leste
- Tizen
- WebOS
Linux Mobile Hardware:
- Fairphone 5
- Volla Phone
- Librem 5
- PinePhone
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So who is the strongest contender here? I hear stuff about pinephone, then nothing. Fairphone, more silence. Purism, so much silence.
I will happily pay someone now for a half decent phone so that by the time android is fully enshittified we all have a place to go.
As far as I know, the most useable pure Linux phone right now is the Furilabs FLX1. They're currently out of stock, and doing preorders for their second batch. By "pure Linux" I mean "a distro pretty close to what you can use on your laptop."
There's also several phones that can run Sailfish OS, including an official device. Sailfish OS isn't quite vanilla Linux, but it might the most useable and supported non-mainstream option. I can't find a clear answer about if you can run regular Linux applications on it, though.
I used Sailfish OS on a Sony Xperia smartphone for about a year until my carrier switched to VoLTE, and Sailfish OS at the time didn't support VoLTE. It does now, though, so I plan on trying it again soon.
Furilabs has my attention simply because you can "seamlessly" run android apps on FuriOS in a container called Andromeda. Might be next after my Pixel 9 /w GrapheneOS is used up.
There's also a grapheneos phone coming out soon which gives a bit of hope
If they at LEAST have SD card expandable storage I'm all about it let's freaking go.
I went with a Motorola over a Pixel just because of those user-considerate features and a (warranty voiding :( ) unlockable bootloader. I'm really hoping something happens for this hardware.
Are you referring to just the rumors that they will partner with an OEM, or did I miss an actual announcement or something?!
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Briefly looked into it, and Sailfish OS looks like it's getting closer to reasonable for an average user. The Aptoide store seems to have major apps (WhatsApp), but it still requires some tinkering, like going into several settings screens manually to do things that pop-up automatically in Android. Not too bad, but definitely only for someone who's okay with a bit of tinkering.
WhatsApp is a "must" for most users globally as it's the defacto messaging protocol standard used most places. Probably more important than SMS/MMS for most users. At least until everyone starts to switch over and something better (Signal, probably) starts to get a big enough install base that people use it.
In Canada, I frequently tell people they can Signal, text, or Whatsapp me, but the only people who ever use Signal with me are family I installed it for.
Games are probably a big deal, too. tbh, it's not a "must", but I'd be annoyed if I couldn't play Minion Masters on my phone. (But I could probably set up Sunshine/Moonlight streaming, if needed.) I'm guessing a lot of people have games that they wouldn't accept not being able to use.
I'm not sure FLX1 counts as a full 100% Linux phone. It uses the android driver stack in order to then boot to Linux. But I guess this might get them stuck with old insecure drivers? Not sure this is the best long term approach.
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Hu? They joy of s linux phone is, that Hardware is not locked to specific software, isn’t it?
I mean if you can install a Linux distro, you can install any Linux distro, not?
So we just need hardware that is strong enough as well as power efficient enough
Maybe a good screen and big battery
It’s one thing to have the hardware allow you to install anything. It’s an entirely different thing to get a set of software capable of managing a phone running on there. Phone hardware is super proprietary most of the time. Even if they release the drivers, someone still has to incorporate them and any hardware features into their OS.
I would not be satisfied with not using mainline kernel…
Here are the big Linux phone contenders that I've found:
I think the only promising one these days is the Furilabs FLX1, but it's definitely good to keep an eye out for how things progress from here.
I had not heard of furi labs until now. I do have some concerns that they operate out of hong Kong, have no published corporate structure or stated ownership and that they are able to produce something so far ahead of any competitors.
It smells like its got a lot of money and resources into it and I'd really like to know who is funding it.
They show one employee on LinkedIn and no job postings. Company size is 2-10 people.
When something seems too good to be true, it probably is. Purism sells their phones for 2x the cost, theyre huge and half-done. I would wager that they are a more realistic representation of where the market really is.
One of the developers used to work (maybe a lead?) on Droidian(/maybe Waydroid; I don't remember, unfortunately) so part of the advancement probably has to do with already having familiarity of the problem-space.
Also, Purism is trying to serve up entirely libre hardware whereas FuriLabs is using Halium to simplify how well things work in the hardware.
So of course Purism is having a much harder time with things.
$550.00
Fast, performant and cheap
It may be fast and performant, but it's not cheap.
If I had $550.00 to spend on a new device I would spend it on a good and powerful computer, for video editing and 3D modeling, not on a phone.
For comparison an used business laptop, costs about $120, an israeli spyware loaded phone costs about $150.
Going from that to $550 is a big jump, and not affordable for most internet users.
I'm an electrical engineer, so I grew up learning about electronics and how you can buy a lot of stuff from Mauser, Vishay, etc.
Usually those companies offer better prices if you buy more and more bulk goods.
For those companies making Linux machines, they might not have the same economies of scale to reach cheaper numbers than Samsung or Google. Then again, Linux phone makers don't have to add the same amount of profit margin as Samsung or Google, although they still have to make some profit to sustain their business.
$550 seems cheaper to me than a carrier phone, which may be a lot of these manufacturers' markets.
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Jolla Sailfish OS. Can buy a phone from them preinstalled, or flash certain Sony Xperia devices with the OS. Runs smooth as butter and has 2+ day long battery life according to owners. Its based on the old MeeGo project from Nokia back in the day and is based on Debian.
If you want something more Linux-like then the FLX1 is it. It runs very close to stock Debian Stable with Posh as the UI, but it runs some Android code underneath for device drivers, so its not a "pure" Linux system, but it's a very good experience and still not controlled by Google.
I wouldnt recommend Fairphone if you want to do Linux stuff with it, it's a perfect AOSP or LineageOS device though.
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Linux phones better be perfect or they’re not worth pursuing waaaaah.
Is phone calls, text, and battery management the baseline?
Phone... calls??
Is that where you video dial the nephews?
I think it's one of those tech things that scammers use.
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My next phone will be a Linux phone. Might be an old refurb. But if Google is fucking up android I don't have a choice.
Full advantage, of their hardware from 1996 /s
Maybe a slight exaggeration but I'm really tired of Linux phones that are charging flagship prices for mid grade hardware from 10 years ago. I don't expect the latest chip by any means but fuckin come on.
I say this as a full time arch user of the past 10 years lol. I love linux and want kde mobile on my phone. I would just like one from this century is all
They just posted this today. Do with it what you will.
I'm not really interested in a phone that runs linux on top of Android software, like what furi labs does. They use Halium, which makes it more like phones running Ubuntu touch or Droidian like what Volla does rather than something like the pinephone or librem V.
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Now, why not just fork AOSP a la grapheneos?
Why we always have to invent something new? Why not just take the fork in the road and go build something better from it?
Thinking modern os, not even google has been able to do it (fuchsia).
Asking the question I was wondering about too. If Google wants to kill AOSP eventually that's all fine and dandy but that doesn't stop people from forking it and continuing its development. And that way, at least, we don't end up with another Windows Phone conundrum where the OS is perfectly fine but will eventually die due to lack of app compatibility (although Windows Phone's demise was helped by some truly knuckleheaded executive decisions too to be fair).
Or, failing this, all Linux phones need a flawless Android emulation layer similar to Proton for Windows games, because I am afraid it will be a significantly steep uphill battle otherwise.
We have already tons of apps for Linux.. And soo many "apps” are already just fancy websites in a container..
FirefoxOS for phones was such a great idea
I am so sad it did mot take off, was a great concept
Tonns of apps for linux are made with PC UX in mind and thus completely unusable on the phone.
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emulation layer is the way to go IMO, best of all the worlds.
Absolutely 100% agree. Rosetta and Proton are great examples of how native-like emulation can be implemented to help support platform transitions.
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If you say it’s hard to install use the https://sailmates.net/ service then advocate that your local repair shop also offer this service then join your distro’s channel for troubleshooting.
NLNet really needs to start funding Flare, the GTK Signal client. If there was a native, fully featured client, I'd drop flaship price on a Linux phone yesterday!
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Dreaming about this since more than a decade. My issues are banking apps, health related apps and basically anything somewhat official. A lot of them won't even work on a rooted Android device. How are things looking in that regard with Linux phone projects?
I'm not really sure the state of things, but what if Linux phones containerized Android apps so they'd appear to be on a non-rooted device?
The GAPPS image on WayDroid is pretty alright. I'm using it on my Linux desktop to play some mobile games. I understand it should be able to support MS Authenticator. But getting the camera to work is pretty hacky so certain functions don't work for me yet.
I have a work phone I can fall back to in the worst case scenario, and I have been consciously avoiding phone use a lot lately.
I am ready to ride out some bugs in a Linux phone.
Edit to add: Or, given the state of the US government and its potential close ties to various tech oligarchs, maybe I should just keep this old iphone as long as possible and just not put anything sensitive on it. I mean we're talking about violent people who think "if you have nothing to hide you have nothing to worry about" is unassailable logic.
The only thing I need on a phone is too use nfc
I support this so much, however due to work, I can not get away from Android/iOS. Many companies want you to install Microsoft Authenticator with this generally wanting to prompt you for MFA authorisation when accessing company resources. On top of this they often want you running Company Portal on your device too if you're accessing resources such as emails or IM
Then they need to give you a work phone.
My personal phone is rooted. I couldn't access anything work related (beyond authenticator) on it even if I wanted to.
I resisted carrying two phones for the longest time... up until recently I worked for places with relatively small IT departments and I trusted the people I worked with and worked for. Now I'm with a much larger company and I don't even know all the people in IT, much less how they have their MDM system setup.
What I didn't expect was how nice it feels to be able to put the phone down when I get home and then forget about it. Of course, anyone who may need to reach me in an emergency knows my personal number, but that's only happened once in the past 2 years.
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Linux phones don't even really exist right now. Wonder why Ubuntu has never tried again.
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